The Descent

1950

born 1910, Seattle, Washington; died 1997 Seattle

The paired paintings Ascent and Descent recall late Cubism in their layering of flat planes, their use of thin dark lines, and the textured blocks of color designating non-representational forms. The interplay of ink lines with multiple flat planes of color also evokes the Japanese woodblock print of the 18th and 19th century. Japanese prints, imported to Europe and the United States beginning in the 1800s, were a frequent source of influence for Impressionists, Post-impressionists and Cubists. Such cross-cultural borrowings were becoming increasingly common, almost to the point of inevitability, by the mid-20th century.

Oil on board

29 3/8 x 20 1/4 in. (74.61 x 51.44 cm)

Gift of Sidney and Anne Gerber

65.174

Not currently on view

Resources

Exhibition HistoryOlympia, Washington, State Capitol Museum, Governor's Festival Of The Arts, 1968.

Bellevue, Washington, Bellevue Art Museum, Eternal Laughter: A Sixty-Year Retrospective Of the Work Of George Tsutakawa, Sept. 15 - Nov. 2, 1990.

Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Views and Visions In The Pacific Northwest, June 7 - Sept. 2, 1990.

Seattle, Washington, Henry Art Gallery, What It Meant to Be Modern: Seattle Art at Mid-Century, Oct. 15, 1999 - Jan. 23, 2000.

Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Northwest Modernism: Four Japanese Americans, Mar. 20, 2021 - June 5, 2022.

Seattle Art Museum respectfully acknowledges that we are on Indigenous land, the traditional territories of the Coast Salish people. We honor our ongoing connection to these communities past, present, and future.

Learn more about Equity at SAM